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Thursday, June 4, 2015

The Devil's in the Details: Finding the Descriptive Sweet Spot in Prose

After an April dedicated to poetry, I’ve moved to
business writing and working on a novel as my two primary areas of linguistic focus.The latter has me thinking more about how to
make descriptions work without stopping the movement of the story.One of the greatest challenges for many fiction
writers is determining what level of detail to include.Some writers over-describe, burden every
sentence with unnecessary modifiers and every paragraph with distracting
descriptions.Others take the opposite
extreme, pushing through a sparse plot without letting the reader visualize
anything.

Unfortunately, no magic formula exists.We may see easily when another writer has
missed the detail sweet spot, but flail desperately when looking for it in our
own writing.And the target moves: some
stories or books require more details than others, and more insidiously, some
moments in a story or book require more detail than others.

With this in mind, this post will focus on an approach
to resolving this dilemma.Rather than
embark on a quixotic quest to create a how-to that fits every situation, I will
explore the function of descriptive details and how to apply that to writing in
a given scene or scenario.

Whose
Scene Is It?

Some characters require more details than others.A person the protagonist passes on the street
may get less visual description than the protagonist or primary
antagonist.Moreover, if the point of
view in the story is limited, it might actually disrupt that point of view to linger
on a description more than an encounter justifies.

Think of story problems in math classes.Teachers and test makers love to toss in extraneous
facts to see whether the student can decide which details matter.Prose writers face the same issue, but with
the power to write out what doesn’t matter.

Focused
Prose

Writing in a focused way does not mean focusing on
everything.Rather, it means focusing on
what matters to the broader story.This
includes both the movement of the plot and development of characters.Is the protagonist vain?Then a description of what s/he sees in the
mirror makes sense.Is this a
first-person narrative from the point of view of someone who hates his or her
job?Then the oppressive atmosphere or dull
drudgery of the workplace matters.In
every description, think about what it contributes, either to a character or to
the plot.If it contributes to neither,
either change it or cut it.

Scenery creates particular issues in this regard.Before devoting a paragraph to a tree, a
writer should have a good reason.Identifying where action occurs might be one, if the location matters.Describing snow swirling across asphalt can
be nice, but the cold or treacherous conditions should tie into the story
rather than merely abutting it.Determine who is doing what and why, and write exposition that reflects
or accentuates this.

Use
Your Verbs

Sometimes a better word choice can eliminate the need
for description.Is a person walking,
ambling, shuffling, or trudging?Each of
these words conveys a different image, a different attitude, much more
efficiently than writing adverbs around “walking.”Active, specific verbs create visual impact
by showing movement.In contrast, nouns
and adjectives around passive verbs tend to sit still, and in doing so deprive
readers of that impact.

Consider what more often distracts you: a color that
sits to your left, or a sudden movement in the same area.The color may be beautiful, bright, and lush,
but the movement pulls you to it.

Giving
Your Writing Curves

None of this should
discourage anyone from pursuing beauty in writing. Rather, pick your
spots.Music that is a wall of sound at
one consistent volume is not music, but noise.Similarly, writing that carries no ebb and flow does not carry a reader’s
attention as well as writing that does.Move through the work, giving details that matter without stopping the
action on every page for those that do not, and you will hold your reader’s
attention—or at least give yourself a better opportunity to do so.

About Me

I am trained as a lawyer and work as a project manager. I am the father of two terrific boys who every day blow my mind in ways large and small. On the outskirts of my everyday life, I write, both poetry and prose.